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Nerval's Lobster writes: Over at Dice, there's a breakdown of which tech jobs have the greatest return on investment, with regard to high starting salaries and growth potential relative to how much you need to spend on degrees and certifications. Which jobs top this particular calculation? No shockers here: DBAs, software engineers, programmers, and Web developers all head up the list, with salaries that tick into six-figure territory. How about those with the worst ROI? Graphic designers, sysadmins, tech support, and software QA testers often present a less-than-great combination of relatively little money and room for advancement, even if you possess a four-year degree or higher, unless you're one of the lucky few.

If you're going to put an Raspberry Pi in there, you might as well put a small cheap LCD on it just in case they don't have HDMI.. There are some pretty cheap options, and they they'll hopefully only have to apply power (include the AC adapter).

This may be a problem, UNIX Time has some known issues with variable size. You must either use a 32-bit version capable of handling Dates higher than 2038, or you must use a 64 bit version that's able to do it right.

Well the whole OS refuse to boot because it can't go past 2038? If it's just playing a video who cares if it's showing the wrong time? I mean I assume a coin battery or whatever would be keeping the system time alive (I haven't purchased a Pi yet) would be dead by then (and you would probably remove it for storage for 100 years anyway) so when the device booted it would presumably show the default epoch time (which for Unix at least I think is January 1st 1970). If you're just watching a video I can't think of a reason why you would need or care if the system time was correct. Or maybe I missed your point entirely.

An anonymous reader writes Imagine for a moment having at your fingertips the ability to send a small robotic messenger — a minion if you will — virtually anywhere in the world and back. Sure, you've seen those fun little drone toys at the mall and perhaps you have had a friend that likes to tinker around with model airplanes, but what you are about to see unfold here is genuinely an unprecedented work of good 'ol fashioned American ingenuity. Apparently a group of hackers has started a kickstarter to build and fly a small drone over North Korea and back and is selling mini tesla coils to do this. "All of the money from this project will be used to extend the distance our drone can fly, so the more backers we have, the farther it will be able to go," they say.

An anonymous reader was one of many to note that Alibaba has bought a $590 million minority stake in Chinese smartphone manufacturer Meizu. "China's Alibaba Group Holding Ltd is taking a $590 million stake in an obscure domestic smartphone maker as the e-commerce giant tests ways to expand its mobile operating system in a shrinking, cut-throat handset market. Extending a previously muted push into hardware, Alibaba said on Monday it will buy an unspecified minority stake in smartphone maker Meizu Technology Co. Dwarfed by rivals like Xiaomi Inc, privately owned Meizu's slice of China's smartphone market is estimated by analysts at below 2 percent. The deal, unlike U.S. rival Amazon.com Inc's foray into smartphones with its own-brand Fire Phone, is designed to help Alibaba push its mobile operating system within China through Meizu's handsets. In return, Zhuhai, Guangdong-based Meizu will get access to Alibaba's e-commerce sales channels and other resources, the companies said in a joint statement."

Dave Knott writes UK Police have arrested an 18-year-old man over involvement in the cyber-attacks on Sony's PlayStation Network and Microsoft's Xbox Live gaming services over Christmas, for which the Lizard Squad hacking group claimed responsibility. The man was arrested Friday in Southport, England, on suspicion of computer hacking, threats to kill and swatting. Computers and other electronic devices were seized during the arrest by officers from two UK cybercrime units working in conjunction with the US Federal Bureau of Investigation. A spokesman said that police were still in the early stages of an investigation working closely with the FBI to identify further people involved in the attacks.

The Force is an energy field in all living things. It separates us, penetrates us and binds us together. If energy can neither be created or destroyed but merely transferred, why would one think it can be "awakened" or gone to sleep?? C'mon JJ, don't let us down!

Well if I can put on my "nerd glasses" for a second I think I have a theory on that. I mean assuming that Clone Wars cartoon show is still "canon" and hasn't been relegated to the "legends" category (like the expanded universe books/etc. And yes, I watched the whole clone wars series. Nerd.). Clone Wars (the one with 22 minute episodes, got canceled with some open story arcs) had some episodes about the dark side taking over, but out of the this imbalance in the yin/yang relationship resulting in a new generation of force wielders would come about (foreshadowing Luke in other words). There were some really strange episodes in that series. Hard to believe it was for kids.

Anyway I think it ties in with that sort of thing. After all, as the story goes the Jedi were effectively extinct by episode 4. The one admiral (whatever) on the death star called it a some old religion and Luke/Han had never even heard of it. So in the sense that the "chosen one" of Luke Skywalker will be rebooting the entire concept of the Jedi order from scratch and it will go from Vader and the emperor being the primary people left doing anything force-related to Luke's new concepts/re-founding of the light side...I'd say it's actually an intriguing/accurate title. Seems like it's a better title than "the light awakens". That doesn't any more sense than "the force awakens"

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Of course, if you want to read too much into it you could say this move is really passing the baton on to a new cast of characters. I mean how much running around/falling/jumping/whatever that original cast do, anyway? I would have expected them to be in this movie about as much as Obi Wan was in episode 4. If you look at it that way it could mean it's "30 years later" (as in, decades after Return of the Jedi) and a generation of new light-side Jedi are taking over. So the force is "awake" in that sense. Lots of new Jedi, lots of new people using the force. I haven't read anything about the new movie, I have no idea if this is remotely accurate.

I'm getting tired of people using Democracy and Republic interchangeably. And I hope hope you'll believe me davydagger when i say I'm genuinely not trying to troll you so forgive me if I'm inferring more from your post than I should be.

The two terms don't mean the same thing. The US was not created to be a Democracy (and Rome was never a Democracy). Democracies have tendency to degrade into tyrannies is the main reason. As soon as a populace realizes they can vote themselves lots of free money along with that famous "51% can be pee on the cornflakes of 49% of the population" line it's just a slow downward spiral (I believe this is not irreversible though. Nothing is set in stone or inevitable). I don't know who said that originally. Republics are a different thing. They're supposed to have safeguards to prevent or at least slow the slide into tyranny.

I happen to live in California where the flag specifically states Republic in no uncertain terms (by which I mean the flag has the words "CALIFORNIA REPUBLIC in big bold letters). As in elect representatives and they do the government running part full time. In a democracy 100% of population would vote on 100% of the matters affecting the population. How long would that last?

Here's the part of the US constitution, if you're wondering. The entirety of Article 4 is actually really short. The Constitution is an amazingly brilliant document.

The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a Republican Form of Government, and shall protect each of them against Invasion; and on Application of the Legislature, or of the Executive (when the Legislature cannot be convened) against domestic Violence.

You'll note it doesn't what kind of republic the states must be. Louisanna for instance is based on the "Napoleonic Code" while the rest are based on british common law.

Also, the house was supposed to be "for the people" as in something happens (like a terrorist attack) and your average citizen talks to their representative which causes the house to pass a bill "in the heat of the moment". The Senators on the other hand, not nearly as much worried about an upcoming election, can take a slower approach. The idea being the bill either won't get through the senate or at least a more moderate version will eventually emerge. I don't know if that's really the way it's working for us right now. Would the Patriot Act be more radical if not for that house/senate balance? No idea. Point is, that was the idea.

I disagree with the thesis that silicon valley is in some way "swinging" toward the Republican party. It's more like the writing was on the wall which way the wind was blowing this midterm and the only way to have any influence or say on policy in Washington is via contributions. As in contributed == friend, didn't contribute == not friend. That's all it is. In 8 years (or whatever) when it's swinging the other direction again money will be flowing back the other direction. It's nothing more or less than that. Be on the good side of the people in power. It's the only way to get anything done. A lot of businesses actually contribute to both parties every election cycle, even if one is more heavily contributed to than the other. Just want to be on the good side for the next wind change.

Maybe I'm missing some thing here but it seems like a edit to a local hosts file could resolve this.

Generically, for instance, if the ads injected were coming from ads.comcast.net one could simply add a line to the hosts file:

0.0.0.0 ads.comcast.net

Wouldn't this prevent the ads from loading to begin with? I mean sure it's a little more difficult on phones and tablets but regular PCs it should be at all difficult to make this edit.

Since I'm apparently in a generous mood, for windows users, open an "administrator command prompt" and paste in the following line. You should be able to save the changes. If not the you might have take off the read-only flag. Sorry, it's been a while since I set it up on a fresh install.

I was hoping someone would mention the RT-N16 as it's currently my favorite router. I have run tomato, openwrt and actually I bought a second one that just came with DD-WRT already installed (even the PDF manual for download didn't have DD-WRT screenshots or mention in anyway).
I like the N16 because it can run all the hose firmwares and it as two USB ports right next to each other as I could run a laptop hard drive in an enclose off of USB directly (which was a lot more important when 128 gig thumb drives were a lot more than $40 as they are now).